


Tennant Swap

by Seesall



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Character Swap, Angst, Crossover, Established Aziraphale/Crowley, Fluff, Multi, Parallel Universes, Thoschei is complicated, not that angsty, probably, read it for entertainment value only, ships and characters can be tagged even if they're only mentioned, the drums the neverending drums
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-09
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-06-24 19:38:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19730428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seesall/pseuds/Seesall
Summary: The Doctor and Crowley find themselves in the wrong Universe, as a threat looms in both worlds.Featuring:- Everyone's favourite Time Lord teaming up with everyone's favourite Angel-part-time-rare-book-dealer, and bending the laws of physics and science because the Author is Bad™ at science fiction;- Everyone's favourite sauntering vaguely downwards Demon dealing with a criminal genius on a leash (aka everyone'srealfavourite Time Lord), and a redhead with a short temper and a sharp tongue;- Not a great deal of action per chapter, really, there are a lot of unnecessary sentences which fill the word counter;- Hiatus. A lot of hiatus. And erratic updates.'English isn't my first language and it shows' club.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a little bit of fun, don't expect it to go anywhere meaningful.
> 
> Dedicated to my best friend. You make me live <3

The TARDIS continuously emitted a low, soft hum you could hear from any room.  
It could lull you to sleep and bring you comfort in dark times - if you had been travelling with her for centuries; it could ground you and distract you — if you had the same drumbeat pounding in your head nonstop since early childhood; it could annoy the living hell out of you for the first few nights, and make you angry-yell at two very weird spacemen — if you were a temp from Chiswick with a very bad temper and travelling with two Time Lords.

In that exact moment, though, Donna was fast asleep in her room and so was one of the Time Lords. The other one was far from available.

Gallifreyan anatomy ensured maximum performance with minimum rest. Meaning: the two only needed to sleep for an hour, in order to feel as well rested as a human sleeping 8 hours. Which was why a whole room devoted entirely to sleep had always felt like a waste of space. Time Lord culture discouraged the building of such rooms: beds were pieces of furniture usually placed in the studio, or in the personal library, or wherever a well behaved Time Lord could need one to rest after a long study session (and wherever rascals could want one to daydream and indulge in much more pleasant explorations).

The TARDIS had proven herself quite knowledgeable of her Thief's tastes and customs, providing him with a room full of electronic trinkets and books he could play with and peruse before bed time. That room had gone unused for quite a while, as the Doctor tended to fall asleep in the main control room, in the middle of maintenance. Once Rose walked in on him curled up under the console and clutching a subatomical retroprocessor as though it was a teddy bear. He thought he would have never heard the end of it. He was sadly proven wrong.

That time, however, with a renegade homicidal Time Lord, who just so happened to be his oldest friend and the last of their kind alongside himself, the Doctor had opted for actually using the room. "To keep an eye on you." He had insisted while keeping himself as far away from the — restrained, but still menacing — Master. To their credit, they let a few days pass by before they started slipping back into their old habits: holding each other as if they were about to get thrown in the Untempted Schism.

The first clue that something was wrong was that the Doctor had woken him up by squirming and scrambling to get away.  
"I didn't allow you to break free." The Master muttered, pushing the man away and rolling on his side. "And people tell me I'm not generous."

"Angel?"

The second clue was the Doctor's voice. Scruffier, darker. As if the Doctor had left, spent 50 years in Scotland, Earth (not to be confused with Scotland, Drekal) with chainsmoking as his only hobby, enrolled in the Brooding Dark Antihero Academy and passed with flying colours.

As the Master sat up and stared at the figure standing at the other side of the bed, the third and final clue gave him a definite picture of what was happening: the Doctor was ginger. And aged up a bit, and wearing a completely out of character dark outfit — complete with sunglasses, which he could have _sworn_ had appeared out of nowhere in a fraction of a second — but that wasn't as telling as the hair.  
"You're not the Doctor." He stated, a feeling of uneasiness seizing his inner organs.

"Where is he?"

"Well, I was hoping you could-"

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO HIM?!" In the blink of an eye, the Not-Doctor was holding the Master by the collar of his shirt, and the Master was deeply regretting the existence of a leash connected to a collar around his throat, bioengineeringly designed to not be able to be removed by him.

"My dear," He started, nice and slow (earning a wince from the person currently pinning him to the headboard), "if you want to keep playing the pronoun game with someone and confuse the situation even more, there's a human a few corridors ahead, but I'm not interested in wasting time."

The grip on his shirt faltered a fraction of a second. The man didn't appear reassured by the news. "So, you're not...?"

" _Human?!_ " The Master scoffed. "Don't insult me. You've broken into a TARDIS, you must have some kind of knowledge."

The Not-Doctor tilted his head, probably in confusion disguised as an attempt to look fierce and totally-knowing-what-is-going-on. "Right. A TAR-that. So you are... yeah, obviously. Of course."

"... you have no clue what I am, right?"

"No! Sort of. Yeah."

The Master hardly refrained from rolling his eyes. Very Doctor-y. With all the dignity he could gather, he stared at the man's sunglasses and went: "I'm a Time Lord."

He didn't know what answer he was expecting, but an unenthusiastic and puzzled "Riiiiiiiiiiight" definitely wasn't what he had pictured.

"Which one are you from?" The man kept going, staring inquisitively at the Time Lord: the latter could see his own reflection in the dark sunglasses. "Has to be Upstairs. 'Time Lord', yeah, stupid name. Pretentious enough to be Heaven."

The Master started to feel vaguely offended by the man's words, and was about to open his mouth and retort, when he kept talking.  
"Listen, Heaven or Hell, if you tell me where Aziraphale is, I might not hurt you."

The Time Lord tilted his head. "Azir... wait. You have nothing to do with the Doctor's disappearance?"

"Who the heck is the Doctor?!"

Pieces of the puzzle suddenly connected in the Master's brain. "Listen. How did you get here?"

"I don't even know where _here_ is, last thing I know I was in my bed, and then I wake up with you breathing on my neck."

Bingpot.

"Speaking of neck," The man frowned, pointing at the Master's collar, "what is that?"

The Time Lord let out a groan of contemptuous frustration. "Besides the point. So, you two were probably switched. When and where is your apartment?" The artificial deadpan of the coloured lenses prompted him to add: "And take off those sunglasses, we're in the middle of space." 

"It was in London, at- hold on, did you just say space?"

An idea started emerging from the coils of the Master's twisted mind, perhaps inspired by the mention of his collar. After all, there were only two people by which that leash could be removed and controlled: one of them was M.I.A., while the other...  
For his standards, it was petty child's play. A silly act of revenge on this moron. Then again, most of his schemes could have been described this way: pettiness and spite are what kept him alive throughout the centuries.

"I can bring you back to your Aziraphale," He cooed in the softest, most alluring voice he could pull off, "all you have to do is go down the corridor, to the door labelled 'Donna'. Open it and ask her to come here."

The man stared down at him — at least, he thought, bloody sunglasses! — and let his collar go, offering his hand. "I'm Crowley. Can I trust you?"

The Time Lord shook it with a smirk. "I'm the Master. And you can. Blindingly."

§§§

The flat was quiet, and had been for the past few hours.

The Apocalisn't - or Apocalypse That Never Was, or I Can't Believe It's Not The End Of Times! - had happened a few weeks earlier, and what Aziraphale and Crowley really needed was a break and an official tick on that 'established relationship' box they had been negotiating over the course of millennia (apparently both of them claimed Archive of Our Own as their side's).  
The tick came in form of Aziraphale more or less settling as a regular in Crowley's flat ("The new book shop has yet to start feeling like home." Both of them had glossed over what as a consequence felt like home), and Crowley reciprocated by finding every excuse to pop by Mr. Fell's book shop. It wasn't long until they started sharing a bed.

Of course, neither Angels nor Demons need to sleep: much like Aziraphale's love for food, sleeping was Crowley's human guilty pleasure. The Angel had soon caught up on the joys of sleeping, when he had tried taking a nap with the Demon and had woken up with arms holding him tighter than he had ever been held before.

That particular morning, Aziraphale opened his eyes to the unusual sight of an empty bed. His initial uneasiness seemingly disappeared as soon as he spotted his Demon crouching next to a wardrobe, busy rummaging through its contents.  
"You startled me, my dear!" He chuckled, rubbing his eyes while pulling at the silk black sheets covering his body. Of course, he could have gone to sleep in his regular clothes, but Crowley had gifted him the cutest pyjamas ever (and it was not a hyperbole, if only because it reminded him of the Demon's flustered face as he gave it to him, which was definitely the cutest thing Aziraphale had seen in millennia): blue sky, with white, fluffy-looking sheep. He had started wearing it a couple of weeks earlier, convincing himself that it was simply out of politeness. Also his 1700s nightgown was starting to get a bit worn out.

Speaking of clothes, the ones Crowley was wearing appeared to be lighter than his usual colour palette, but in the dim light it was hard to tell. It was — however — quite easy to notice a shudder in the figure, who immediately stood up, managing to accidentally open the curtains as he fumbled away from the wardrobe.  
"Dearest, when did you dye your hair? I wasn't expecting a-"  
He took a better look at the man: big, perfectly normal brown eyes and brown, sticky uppy hair framing a younger face than expected were the only thing differentiating him from Crowley.  
"O-oh, gosh." The Angel felt colour in his body draining from his face, anxiety suddenly getting the worst of him.

Admittedly, he had been letting his guard down ever since the Nevermind-geddon: the possibility of a retribution of either Heavenly or Hellish nature had been carefully considered the days following the Deed. Then it had been just as carefully discarded, alongside with Aziraphale's coat and Crowley's jacket, and — much like those garments — promptly lost on the way to the bedroom. And now the Angel was faced with what simply _had_ to be a revenge scheme of some sorts. A stranger looking almost exactly like his Demon, plopping in his room right as he was sleeping? Definitely the work of someone, either up or down. And yet...

"You have no idea how I got here, haven't you?"  


The man's voice made Aziraphale jump. It was sweet and confused and kind, and if it didn't kill the last part of him who still thought this could be his Demon, it at least landed a critical hit.  
He shook his head, suddenly reminded of his current appearance. "Er, how about we discuss this over a nice cup of tea? Just wait in the kitchen, I'll be right there."  


"Where am I?" The poor man's question was barely covering a deep concern that made the Angel feel incredibly sorry for him. "Wait, no. Better question: _when_ am I? Wait-" Aziraphale's head was starting to spin, as the stranger pulled out a thin glowing metallic stick on him and checked it thoroughly. "'Not human'? So, better-er question — is that a word? Who knows, I'll check — what are _you_?"  


Aziraphale's eyes widened in uncontrollable outrage. "Dear boy, that is quite enough!" He cried out, sitting up straight in all his contempt. "You appear in our bedroom, go through our-" He hesistated. " _Through personal belongings that do not belong to your person_ , and then ask me what I- why, this has 'Hell' written all over it!"

Meanwhile, he had miracled his regular clothes on and had stepped off the bed, walking directly to the strange man with a stormy look on his face.  
"Teleportation of clothing? Brilliant, how did you- wait wait wait!" The man yelled, holding his hands up, silvery wand still beeping in one of them. "I don't know who you're talking about, but I swear, I really don't want to hurt you."  


The man's voice was soothing and nice, and he looked _so much like him_... Aziraphale quickly lost all of his momentum, still maintaining a fair level of suspicion.  


"I'm the Doctor," the stranger carried on, slowly lowering his arms, "and until 10 minutes ago, I was in my... ship. So, really, I know as much as you do."  


The Angel blinked a few times, reaching hesitantly out to stroke the Doctor's hair — just to be sure he wasn't dreaming. "Pardon for the curiosity, but did you fall asleep with your clothes?"

The man nodded somewhat embarrassed. "I wasn't planning on falling asleep."

"Quite fair. My name's Aziraphale, in any case. And are you sure you're not... oh, what a silly question! But... you're not... Crowley, are you?"  


"I'm afraid not. Is he your friend? The one you mistook me for?"  


Aziraphale's cheeks turned pink against his will. Even in such a serious situation, the thought of calling Crowley anything stronger than 'rival colleague' made his heart beat faster. His body was equipped with the same bodily reactions as a normal human. Sometimes it was for the better, sometimes for the worse. "He was sleeping next to me."  


"Exactly where I woke up." A shadow crossed the Doctor's face, followed by full blown concern. "Which could mean that Crowley has taken my place on the TARDIS."  


Aziraphale did _not_ like the way the Doctor had said the sentence. "Oh, dear, what's the TARDIS? Is it bad? Is it dangerous?"  


"Oh, no, the TARDIS is just my ship, I'm more worried about the company your friend is in. If I'm right..." The Doctor's glance flickered around in the room, settling eventually on the angel's wide eyes. 

The Angel gulped, trying to maintain a well controlled, calming facial expression. "I-It will be fine. He is incredibly tough. Faced two Dukes of Hell, all on his own." He was nearly beaming with pride at this mention, which managed to puzzle the Doctor even more.  


"Right, cause there's still the bigger-er question: what are you? Don't worry," He hastily added, noticing Aziraphale's barely-concealed huff, "I'm not human either."

The sentence didn't shock the Angel too much — the man didn't feel like a human at all — but he also seemed foreign to Heaven and Hell. "It's a long story, I'm afraid. Where's your ship? I can get us there — in reasonable times."  


The Doctor grimaced. "That is a long story, too, I'm afraid. How long is yours?"  


"About 6000 years. Yours?"  


"900 years."  


"Then," Aziraphale stepped away from the man with a polite albeit worried smile, "I will make that cup of tea while we chat."


	2. Chapter 2

_Blindingly._

Crowley's face - even with the sunglasses - expressed the diametrically opposite feeling from trust.

The burn was already starting to fade, with a healing speed that, in a competition, would have left Gallifreyan anatomy eating dust. Human anatomy would have curled up in a fetal position at the start line, crying out for its mummy.

The injury of course came from Donna: barging in her room, demanding her to follow him? Practically asking to be hit. The hair straightener was allegedly already in her hand, and had been used as soon as she realised that the Doctor's voice didn't come from the Doctor. Apparently the telltale sign had been Crowley's sunglasses, which had fallen at one point to reveal what Donna had repeated for two full minutes to have been: "Snake. Eyes. Actual snake eyes! _And_ he looks like the Doctor! This bloke's the Devil!"

"Not quite." Crowley — barely suffocating a smirk even in such circumstances — proceeded to start explaining who he was, demanding an explanation in return.

Once the human had listened to the man talking and had agreed to free the Time Lord - reluctantly and on the one condition of constantly holding the leash - they had taken the conversation to the main control room, where the Master was currently bickering with the TARDIS - so to speak.

"Maybe the poor sod went off on his own, away from you mad people." Crowley was hissing - quite literally, actually: the Master noticed that he dragged his 'sss' a little more than needed, when angry or experiencing similarly intense emotions. "Wouldn't blame him."

Donna had been staring at him from afar for quite some time, in distrustful suspicion. "So, you're a Demon. I mean, the actual Fallen Angel deal."

Crowley made a face. "I wouldn't call it _falling_ , exactly... and don't look so surprised, you travel through time and space with a Lord of Time, or something."

"I've been travelling with these two for over a month, they're old news. Oh, if Pam from next office were here, she would eat her rosary..."

The Master tugged at his leash. "Move. Three feet to the left." He dryly commanded, not at all bothered by the fact that he had interrupted the two talking. 

Donna rolled her eyes, reluctantly obeying with that certain kind of cheeky bitterness that takes the fun away from authority. "Whatever you say, Mr. Saxon."

"Mr. Saxon?" The Demon leaned over the console, with an insufferable smirk. "I thought you were 'The Master'."

"I am- step away from that lever or we'll end up stuck in the Time Vortex." The Demon slowly backed away from the lever. "Good. As I was saying, I _am_ the Master. Saxon is an alias."

Donna scoffed. "Bloody good alias. This bloke thought he could become Prime Minister!"

" _And I did_." The Master muttered through gritted teeth, barely refraining from glaring at the two and instead focusing on putting in the coordinates. "You just don't remember it because the Doctor undid my one year of power." His one true consolation, what kept him going when Donna teased him, was that during the Year That Never Was, she had probably died a painful and miserable death. "I am trying to save your owner, you stubborn old-" The last bit was muttered to the TARDIS, who wasn't exactly cooperating as she should. The Master slapped the console and the TARDIS took off, defiantly keeping the brakes on and making that awful wheezing sound.

Crowley grabbed one of the brown things emerging from the floor - style was never the Doctor's signature feature - as the TARDIS began to shake more than usual. "The Doctor, the Master... did your parents _really_ hate you, or did they just have very clear expectations for your future careers?"

The Time Lord shrugged. "It was mutual distaste, with mine." He mumbled, flipping one final switch as the TARDIS landed. "And," He added out loud, walking up to the door, "I'm sure my parents are watching over me, disapproving all of my life choices. In fact, you can ask them, if you want to, and we can all go visit them. After all, you've just proven to me that Hell exists."

His tone was so scornful, that the Demon felt compelled to reply, in a deeply offended voice. "You still don't believe that I'm a Demon."

"I've seen Daemons before, and you do not qualify as one." The Master tugged at the leash and Donna moved closer, as he swung the door open. "London, exact date, exact address, nice meeting you."

"Wait, what about the Doctor?" Donna asked, as Crowley ran down the alley they appeared in and towards the building in front of them, with not so much as a goodbye or a glance back.

"As soon as Crowley waltz into his house, he'll alert the Doctor that we're here and my freedom will come to an abrupt end." But the Time Lord was hesitating. He kept staring at the demon, curiosity gnawing at him. The curse of Time Lords: an almost genetic desire to learn everything, to leave no stone unturned and no mystery unveiled.  
Perhaps that's why the Doctor had been such an outsider on Gallifrey: the man was a walking question mark (sentence taken literally by his Fifth, Sixth and Seventh incarnation. The Master still cowered in remembrance of those fashion disasters, and made a point to bring them up at any given opportunity to embarrass the Doctor.)

"You don't sound convinced."

"Shut up, you humans could never understand."

"Oi!" Donna gave the leash a pull, just to clarify who was in charge. "Watch it."

They bickered for a few minutes, interrupted only by a figure running towards them. A figure with red hair and a black leather jacket. "He's not there! I rang and-" He stopped, mouth agape as he finally got a good look at the police box in front of him. "Is... is this..."

"Yes, it's the TARDIS, yes, it's bigger on the inside, questions later. Where's the Doctor?" The Master cut Crowley off, dragging him back inside and shutting the door.

"The street is the same, the building is the same, I went to my flat, and everything was different. None of my furniture was there, the walls were pink and there was a _family_ there, claiming to have lived in _my_ flat for years!" The Demon was a few inches away from the Master's face, looking ready (and desperate enough) to punch him.

Donna immediately placed herself between the two, in an extremely human moment of forgetting her own safety. "You two, I've seen enough bar fights to know where this is going, and I am stopping it before anyone here does something stupid."

Crowley glared at the Master from above Donna's shoulders, before loudly sighing and turning away. "My Bentley is gone as well, the name on the intercom is different... it's like I've never existed in the first place! Did you put in the right date?"

The Master — utterly offended by the lack of trust in his pilot abilities — pointed at the console and made his way there, followed by Donna, to check the scanner. "Yes. It's the right date. 2019, you can even smell the end of the decade. I actually passed my TARDIS flying exam, first try."

"Then why is there no trace of my existence?!"

"Maybe when you were swapped, the Universe realised that there's no such thing as Angels and Dem-" The Master's snark reply got cut halfway through, as a hypothesis solidified in his brain. "Oh. _Oh_." The Master tapped on the wall rhythmically: suddenly the drums felt very comforting.

"'Oh', what?" Crowley's eyebrows shot up in an inquisitive expression — sort of ruined by the sunglasses.

"It has been theorised, but... the TARDIS could never withstand such a..."

"Oi, Drumman, would you mind speaking clearly for once?!"

The Master held his forehead in his hands. The drumming had increased, but the idea was still there. And it still made frighteningly perfect sense. "There's a simple reason why there's no trace of you anywhere, and it has to do with you not existing at all." Before Crowley — baffled out of his mind — could ask him to explain, the Time Lord turned to him, uncharacteristically sober. "In this version of Earth, at least."

Realisation suddenly dawned on the Demon, who suddenly had all colour drained from his face. "And a good old middle finger..." He muttered grimly, looking up at the ceiling, as if talking to an invisible, particularly secretive Dealer who _smiles all the time_ , "... to the Ineffable Plan."

§§§

The tea had grown cold in both cups, as both men tried to make sense of their new knowledge.

The Doctor had yet to get over his 'That's Impossible' phase: his brain — apparently — had not given up on finding fallacies in the reasoning laid in front of him, and he found himself blurting out compelling evidence whenever possible.  
"But I've been on Earth, well over 6000 years ago!"

"My dear boy, that's impossible. I would know, I've been here since 4004 B.C.!"  
Aziraphale sighed, equally as stubborn in his belief. God's Plan had proven to be quite Ineffable (and in Crowley's elegant phrasing "a hot, steaming pile of faeces"), but as far as he knew, time travelling aliens had no role to play in it. Obviously he was aware of the existence of other planets — Aziraphale had even heard of a certain 'Gallifrey', somewhere — but the Doctor was adamant of the Earth having existed for over 4 billion years, bringing up travels of his to support his claim. Truth be told, the Angel didn't quite get the whole Time Lord thing, but had politely nodded and smiled nonetheless.

The Doctor held his ground. "It's 2019. You've been in London in the past few decades, right? And you're not human, so your brain doesn't make up silly excuses for what it can't understand."

Aziraphale nodded: apparently human thickness was a common problem. Sometimes even among humans.

"2005. The Autons. All the mannequins attacking people." The Angel's confusion prompted him to insist. "2007. Harold Saxon running as Prime Minister."

"Harold who?" Aziraphale contemplated indulging this man's belief, but in this case, polite white lies would not have brought them anywhere.

The Doctor's eyes lost all their warmth for a split second, as if the words he was about to speak bore remembrance of a terrible loss he still had to cope with. "2006. The Army of Ghosts. Daleks and Cybermen roaming around in the sky."

Aziraphale shook his head once again. "Dear boy, I think you should-"

But the Doctor clearly wasn't listening. Something he said apparently set his gears ticking: that one slap to the computer that miraculously un-freezes it and gets it to work.  
"2006. Mickey's grandma. Mickey's grandma!" He stood up so fast, the chair behind him fell down. "Of course, it's the only explanation, well, it's either _that_ or I've hallucinated 900 years of my life, and that probability is pretty slim, and to be fair, if I _had_ hallucinated my entire life, I would have to compliment my brain for the imagination and the cruelty, but I digress."

Aziraphale, about to miracle the chair back in its place, found himself staring at the man in confusion. "I, er, I must confess that I have no clue what you're talking about." He chuckled awkwardly, as the Doctor grabbed the two cups of tea and placed them next to each other in front of the Angel; the silver spoons clinked lightly against the fine porcelain. The man leaned over from the other side of the table, staring at Aziraphale right in the eyes.

"This," He pointed at one of the cups, "is your Universe. Your version of the Earth, your version of Gallifrey, your version of everything. And this," He pointed at the spoon in the aforementioned cup, "is Crowley."

Aziraphale began to see where he was going.

"The other cup is my Universe. My Earth, my Gallifrey, my Raxacoricofallapatorius, everything. And the other spoon is me. Both cups of tea, both full fledged Universes, but completely separated."

Aziraphale fully understood. And desperately wished he didn't. "Parallel universes?"

"Parallel universes. I've been to one, although it wasn't _this_ different, but infinite universes equal infinite possibilities. There could be one where Sherlock Holmes is a real person, living in 2010's London. Who knows." He held up the two spoons in his hands while he was talking. "Now, something happened and Crowley and I switched places." With a slow, almost theatrical movement, his wrists crossed as he lowered the two spoons in the opposite cup from where they were taken.

"Oh. Oh, gosh." Was Aziraphale's far-from-eloquent response, as he wrapped his fingers around the Doctor's-Universe cup, gently caressing the Crowley Spoon. "Oh, my poor Crowley. But how do we bring you two back where you belong?"

The Doctor, who was _not_ dealing with the discovery much better, shook his head defeated. "I don't know, I... I'm stuck." He declared out loud in shocked disbelief. "Stuck in a parallel universe, no TARDIS, no communication, the Master alone-"

Aziraphale glanced up — trying his hardest to prevent tears from welling up in his eyes — to see the Doctor wide eyed and almost panicked.

"The Master alone!" The Doctor repeated, the terror in his voice enough to make a shiver run down Aziraphale's spine. "Oh, this is bad. This is really, really bad. Donna- I have to-"

The Angel let go of the cup and stood up as well, walking up to the frenzied Time Lord. "Listen," He started, carefully selecting each word, "this is my first time dealing with parallel universes, so I don't quite know what to do. I can take you to my bookshop, where you can use my computer and books to make some research." He didn't have the heart to tell him that a few of his precious first edition books had been substituted with books in line with the taste of an 11 year old Antichrist. "I can also offer you my network of informants — the remaining ones after the-"

"Failed Apocalypse, yeah." The Doctor passed a hand over his face, his breathing a little bit steadier. "Thank you, Aziraphale."

The Angel's heart ached a little more. "You really do sound and look like him. Uncannily so."

"Right, have you got a picture of him? Or a recording." From the sound of it, the Doctor himself didn't quite know why he asked. Probably sheer curiosity. Still, Aziraphale couldn't blame him and obliged.

Crowley has convinced him to keep up with the times, by giving him a smartphone. "In case another Apocalypse breaks out and you actually feel like telling me stuff." He had also been particularly keen on keeping him constantly updated on his inventions throughout the centuries; which meant that the Demon had on his phone about 7000 selfies of the two of them from the late 2000s up to that year. And obviously, as soon as Aziraphale had found himself with a phone equipped with a front camera, Crowley had insisted on the two of them taking _even more_ selfies, with the excuse that "after the Armageddidn't-Really-Happen, who's keeping track of who's fraternizing with whom, anyway?"

He didn't have to search for long: as soon as he opened his gallery, he went to the folder dedicated to Crowley, looking for any video he could play with minimal melting on his part. One of them caught his attention: he remembered it from a few days before, and deemed it safe enough to play.  
"Here you go."

 _"Hey, angel,"_ his face popped up on his screen, and the Doctor went pale, _"you will **not** believe the day I've just had. I'll tell you all about it tonight, at my flat. Hope you didn't forget, with your head always up in the clouds, because I **really** had to fight for these éclairs. See you, don't accidentally discorporate while I- **WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GOING, YOU DAMN-** "_ The video mercifully cut off, with Crowley about to make a rather obscene gesture at a car passing by.

The Doctor looked shocked. It's one thing to be told that you look like someone, and another to realise that you and said person could sing an impromptu duet on the street on how you're just like them and they're just like you. "Unbelievable. He's..."

Aziraphale patted his shoulders in a friendly gesture meaning that he understood and there was no need for him to finish the sentence.  
His reaction would probably have been slightly different, if he had known that the first — to his credit extremely brief — thought fleeting through the Doctor's mind had been 'Why is _he_ ginger?!', followed by 'Why does he walk like _that_?!', and 'Why is he wearing sunglasses, when it's clearly cloudy?'.

Finally, the Doctor examined the smartphone, seemingly reluctant to give it back to the Angel. "Wait. I think I might..." He grabbed his silvery wand (apparently called a "sonic screwdriver") and pointed it at the device. "Give me 30 minutes, a computer and a couple of miracles and we might get in contact with your friend."

Aziraphale was so overwhelmed by the news, he reacted by half-cheerfully-half-nervously blurting out: "He's not my friend."

The Doctor blinked a few times, almost taken aback by the sentence. "Sorry. Who is he, then?"

Aziraphale thought hard about it for a couple of seconds, then the answer dawned on him, as simple and expected as it had been for 6000 years. He gave the Time Lord a soft, glowing, almost Heavenly smile. "Husband. He's my husband. And now, I'll take you to my bookshop."


	3. Chapter 3

The Master had spent the past few minutes muttering to himself, tapping rhythmically on any available surface while dragging Donna across the main control room, and exchanging few harsh words with both the Demon and the human.

"And would you mind stopping with the ta-ta-ta-tap?!" Crowley burst out, leaning against the wall in a fit of melodramatic irritation: if there had been a couch, he would have flung himself on it in a fashion reminiscent of Dorian Gray. Crowley looked like the kind of person who had read The Portrait of Dorian Gray and taken the figure of Lord Henry Wotton as a role model. A former Dorian Gray who had succumbed to sin and took now delight in tempting other naïf fools. Fitting for a Demon.

The Master answered with a cryptic scoff, half buried in an old, dusty chest; he mumbled something unintelligible, taking out all sorts of gadgets.

"I doubt the Doctor would be happy with you going through all of his stuff." Donna tightened the grip on the leash, occasionally eyeing Crowley up and down with the subtlety of a neon yellow jacket in a clothing shop for Goth people. In this particular comparison, Crowley would have been an entirely colourblind person who accidentally wandered into the shop and was interested only in finding a way out, considering how he seemed almost unaware of her existence.

"He can personally scold me once he is actually here." Working like this, with saving the Doctor as the main goal... the Master was almost on the brink of an identity crisis. Who was he, if not the Doctor's archnemesis? Being stuck in the TARDIS as a prisoner - _as a pet_! - was already humiliating enough, to the point where he often found himself wishing Lucy had shot him right there on the Valiant. Thinking back to his emotional state, he figured he would probably have refused to regenerate and died right there and then. Would the Doctor have cried for him? Hard to tell. But only now it dawned on him that in another Universe there had been another Lucy, on another Valiant, who had not been as merciful as to let another Master go. His breath got caught in his throat for a second, as the images of what could have happened played in his head with vivid details.

Donna crossed her arm with an outraged expression. "Do you think this is easy for me? What, stuck with a lunatic and a literal Demon, running on less than six hours of sleep _and_ forced to deal with said lunatic and Demon whining because they miss their boyfriends?! What even is the point of you two being super ancient and powerful, if you keep acting like eight year olds on a playground?!"

Both Crowley and the Master looked down, victims of that unjustifiably annoyed shame typical of being fairly scolded by someone whose reprimand is particularly accurate.  
The Time Lord put the chest back with a frustrated huff; the Demon pulled out his wallet from his pocket, taking out an old photograph. 

Donna tied the leash to the console and gave the Master her best "do anything shady and you won't see the light of day ever again" glare (a pretty solid glare at that), before walking up to Crowley.  
"Is that him?" She asked (mercifully avoiding to say his name out loud, in fear of accidentally mispronouncing it) pointing at the black-and-white photo: a man was sheepishly smiling at the camera, hat in his hands and waistcoat slightly unbuttoned. 

Crowley nodded, rubbing his thumb affectionately on the yellowed picture. "Aziraphale." His voice contained such reverential affection and unabashed admiration, that the Master's cold hearts almost warmed up.  
_Almost_.  
It was abundantly clear by now that the Demon had a fatal weakness, and that weakness was Angel-shaped. Good to know. 

__"He looks kind." Donna couldn't help but reciprocate the contagious soft smile of the man in the picture._ _

__"Well, one can say that he is. I mean, he's an _Angel_ , what did you expect?" Crowley stared at the photograph for a few seconds more, before shoving it back in his wallet. "Bit of a bastard, though, if you ask me."  
It would have been more convincing if his voice hadn't cracked halfway through the sentence._ _

__The Master scoffed, leaning against the console as his eyes fluttered shut. "A _do_ rable. If you're going to cry, take off your sunglasses. I could use a little amusement." His eyelids slowly opened again and his fingers darted to the knot tying the leash: as soon as he tried to disentangle it, the material hardened, becoming as solid as stone and preventing him from any action._ _

__' _Kill everyone_ ', the drums were yelling between his ears, uncaring of the actual attainability of what they demanded. ' _We're calling you. It's time for war.'_  
"Shut up." He whispered, swatting at the air around him, as if trying to hit a mosquito._ _

__Donna looked one insensitive remark away from slapping him. "Show some respect! He might not see his boyfriend ever again, everyone with a little bit of heart would react like this."_ _

__A soft gasp came out of Crowley: Donna's words made the situation appear realer and only now did it fully dawn on him that Aziraphale was _in another Universe_._ _

__The Master gave Donna a brief deranged grin — more akin to a grimace than an actual smile. "I have _two_ hearts, and yet do you see me mourning the Doctor?"_ _

__"He told me that you tried to kill him, what, billions of times? Him getting stuck in another Universe is probably your dream come true!"_ _

__Was it?_ _

__The Doctor out of the way _was_ usually a crucial component for the success of his schemes. Admittedly, it would have been far more satisfying had he taken care of the Doctor himself: he vaguely remembered it being so, from centuries ago. And yet...  
The collar. That was why he was working so hard on bringing him back._ _

___'Kill everyone, the Doctor too.'_ _ _

__He was _not_ going to spend the rest of his life with that leash, and the only person who could take it off was the Doctor.  
He had been meaning to devise a plan to force him to remove it, but so far he had not found the right inspiration. Or motivation._ _

___'You're getting soft. Don't hesitate. Just rule them all.'_ _ _

__The drumming was getting too loud. It had been for the past few minutes, but the Master thought he could push through it._ _

__"Shut up. Shut up shut up shut up SHUT **UP**!" The sound of the Master's fist colliding with the console prompted a heavy silence to fall on the main control room. Not like the Time Lord could ever experience heavy silence._ _

__Crowley stealthily wiped away his tears, and lightly cleared his throat. "Is... is he okay?" The — one might argue poorly worded — question he whispered to Donna arose naturally, as the Master held his head in his hands, muttering indecipherable words to himself._ _

__"The Doctor explained to me that he has got some... drumming in his head, and sometimes it gets really bad. Like 'I hear him screaming from my room' kind of bad."_ _

__Crowley remained still got a few seconds, then sighed softly, nodded, mouthed something to an invisible interlocutor and slowly approached the Time Lord, who by now was barely aware of his and Donna's existence. "Master."_ _

__The Master's head shot up, and for a split second his lips moved to identify the figure in front of him as 'Doctor'.  
Once he remembered who was actually standing in front of him, however, he emitted what could very well have sounded like a low, menacing growl, taking a step back. "What?!" He snarled, attempting to get even further away from the Demon — and failing, as the leash was already stretched at its maximum capacity._ _

__"You're my ticket to Aziraphale, I will not hurt you." Crowley somehow felt the need to explain, placing two fingers on the Master's temples._ _

__Before the Time Lord had the time to move, or emote at all, the drums dropped to a manageable volume. "What-"_ _

__"I couldn't remove them completely, something's well determined to keep them there." Crowley nonchalantly sauntered back to his spot, where he pretended to check very thoroughly his fingernails to play it cool. "But you owe me a favour, now."_ _

__Donna's gaze was darting from the laidback Demon to the still shaken Time Lord, who was absent mindedly assessing the state of his hand, bruised from hitting the console: it would have been like new in minutes, the blow had not been too hard. What would have become of the drums, however, was another can of worms. 'Perhaps,' the Master mused, trailing with his fingertips the metal of the console, 'there is a silver lining to this.'_ _

__Donna opened her mouth to congratulate Crowley on his kind gesture — which she was 100% convinced had gone to waste — when one of the very few instances capable of shutting Donna Noble up occurred. Her mobile phone rang._ _

__"That's weird. I wasn't expecting any phone calls." She squinted at the screen. "And I don't recognise the number."_ _

__Crowley glanced at her phone. The digits on the display forced him to take another, more careful look — going as far as to take off his glasses. His heart skipped quite a few beats. "It's Aziraphale's number."_ _

__The Master's attention was abruptly yanked back to the two of them; Donna gave the Demon a puzzled look and slowly answered the call, putting it on speakers._ _

____

§§§

" _Biggles Goes To Mars_?"

Aziraphale's fingers stuttered to a halt on the book he was leafing through. "Oh, er... it's a long story."

The ride to the bookshop had been... interesting. Crowley's Bentley — the second fastest mean of transportation — was unavailable: when the Doctor suggested using his sonic screwdriver to break in the car, the Angel had given him a horrified glance. The Demon had already lost his _original_ 1926 Bentley, and Aziraphale was _not_ going to place his beloved Crowley's beloved automobile in the not-so-beloved hands of an almost stranger, no matter how skilled with vehicles said stranger declared himself to be. So they had taken the fastest mean of transportation to Mr. A. Z. Fell's bookshop — and the most exciting for the Doctor ("Try to make as little noise as possible," Aziraphale had warned him as they took off in the sky, "it makes it easier for me to miracle humans' attention away from us.").

The bookshop was — as always during perfectly reasonable hours such as 11 AM — sporting its "Sorry! We are closed" sign, and in that particular spot the windows were blocked by bookshelves and ladders, so the Angel took the liberty to fully stretch his sore wings. The Doctor remained frozen a couple of seconds, mesmerised by the candid ruffled feathers — almost glowing when illuminated by the rays of sunshine filtering between books. He struck Aziraphale as the kind of person who finds the beauty in simple things: the little marvels of Creation.

"Brilliant." The Time Lord mumbled with a grin going from ear to ear, before putting away the book and setting to work on the computer and the smartphone.

As it turns out, 30 minutes was a very optimistic take on the time necessary to carry out the task of communicating across Universes.

29 minutes in, and Aziraphale had changed reading position 13 times (and book 7 times).

36 minutes in, and Aziraphale had already miracled into existence: a few copper wires (for the Doctor), a satellite dish on the roof (for the Doctor), a pair of pliers (for the Doctor), and a glazed doughnut (for himself).

42 minutes in, and Aziraphale had accidentally knocked over an empty fishbowl — which he could have sworn he had never bought himself — while pacing, and began saying to himself "Don't panic" in a nice friendly tone.

At 51 minutes in, Aziraphale sheepishly approached the Doctor as he was connecting a miniscule wire to a miniscule circuit with the aid of miniscule pliers and an enormous magnifying glass.  
"So..." He started, hoping to catch the Doctor's attention without making him flinch. (He failed.) "How's it going?"

The Doctor's frustrated groan constituted a perfectly good — albeit nonverbal — answer. "I was able to enhance your phone so that it has signal in every corner of every Galaxy at any point in time, and then I got stuck."

Aziraphale nodded in understanding, sitting on the chair next to the Doctor and leaning over to see his smartphone dismembered, the single parts connected together and plugged in the antediluvian (not literally. Aziraphale should know, he had been there with Crowley when Noah had built his ark) computer. "Well, that's still impressive, isn't it?"

Judging from the Time Lord's dejected expression, it wasn't. But there was something more: a lingering frustration stemming from somewhere else. "I've been working on trying to communicate across Universes for a while." The Doctor explained in a disheartened, exhausted tone, keeping his motives to himself. "I did it once, but I had my TARDIS, a rift between the two Universes and the energy of a burning sun. I thought- I thought since the phone I want to reach is enhanced as well... and since the link might still be open... but the signal is so weak I can barely detect it." A subtle vein of hopelessness-fuelled anger tinted the Doctor's words, and Aziraphale felt a shiver running down his spine.

"You did your best." The Angel hazarded, in his most sympathetic tone.

"It's not enough!" The Time Lord's sudden yell made Aziraphale retract in his chair, away from him. "I was _so_ close!" A deep, shaky sigh. "It would take a miracle to broadcast even a few minutes of understandable audio."

That's when something in Aziraphale's head clicked.  
If Crowley could imagine that a lump of metal and leather engulfed in flames was a fully functional car and drive from the M25 to Tadfield, the Angel could very well imagine that the signal was strong enough to reach another Universe.  
He stood up, staring very intently at the dismantled mobile phone the Doctor was working on: the latter was currently and carefully holding up the screen, with the defeated expression of someone who has just lost 7 chapters of their latest work. "Try calling now."

The Doctor looked up at him in puzzlement, which gradually turned in understanding and surprised hope — much like when you find out that you have another copy of the deleted drafts. "Of course... a miracle!"  
Following a brief exchange with Aziraphale for the password, he dialled Donna's number and pressed 'call'; after a second of thought, he put the call on speakers.

Tuu... tuu... tuu...

_"Hello?"_

"Donna, it's me!"

_"Doctor?"_

"Yes, I don't know how much time we've got, so please-"

From the other side came agitated unintelligible voices, culminating in the sounds produced as a result of someone yanking a phone away from a sassy temp from Chiswick.

_"How do I land the TARDIS in a parallel Universe?"_ The tone was dictatorial, demanding an immediate answer; the Doctor took in a sharp breath — whether of relief or contempt, Aziraphale couldn't say: he was using 85% of his concentration to keep the phone call going.

_The Doctor created a perfectly functional mean of communication between Universes, it's going to hold._ That was the mantra he kept repeating in his head.

"You can't." The Doctor's tone, while not outright bossy, held a peremptory feeling to it, leaving no room for concessions or bargains. "It happened once on accident and she barely survived."

_"Right, so I'm supposed to get stuck the rest of my life with this collar around my neck and these two getting in my way. I _don't_ think so, Doctor. So you get here somehow, or I'll find the way to land your TARDIS there, no matter the consequences. And you know I will, eventually."_  
The obnoxious confidence emanating from this man's arrogance made Aziraphale wish the Doctor would dismiss his claim as overexagerated, or at least scoff at his childish antics.

Instead, a gloomy dark cloud found its way on the Doctor's face, bearing unequivocal signs of an oncoming storm. "Yes. I know you will, Master. And I'm not happy about leaving you unsupervised, either. Who knows what you're plotting..." The Doctor admitted through gritted teeth, before shaking his head: the clouds dissipated; the storm had been deflected — or rather, put on hold. "Back to the point. Is the Demon Crowley there?"

A snort. _"Ask him personally."_

A muttered curse in the background — aimed apparently at 2008 phones — indicated a change in person holding the phone.

_"Angel?!"_

Aziraphale's concentration faltered. "Crowley! Oh, dear, are you okay? Are you hurt?"

_"-sho-ld be- -e one as--ng!"_

The Doctor frowned at the disturbed communication and typed something on the computer, glancing at the Angel. "The signal is getting weaker."

Aziraphale widened his eyes apologetically, bringing his attention back to the phone.

_The Doctor created a perfectly functional mean of communication between Universes, it's going to hold, and Crowley is okay. **Crowley is okay**_

_"Angel, are you there?"_

The Doctor reassured Aziraphale with a — doubtfully effective — smile, before taking the conversation in his own hands. "Hello, Crowley! Wow, we really do sound like each other, I'm the Doctor, by the way. Anyway, your husband is busy miracling my communication device into functionality, but he wants you to know he's alive and well. Now, do you remem- Crowley, are you still there?"

From the other side was coming a very soft whimper. _"Did **he** use the 'H' word?"_ The voice was at least an octave higher than before; the Demon immediately tried to play it off by clearing his throat. _"Can he hear me?_ He mumbled in a significantly lower voice.

Aziraphale's heart ached.

The Doctor cleared his throat as well. "Yes."

An embarrassed silence. Crowley cleared his throat again. _"Yes. Of course. Angel, don't worry too much about me. I mean, you can cry if you feel like it, I promise I won't judge too much."_

_"That would be quite hypocritical of yours."_

_"Can't you let them have a moment?! You Time Lords really have no idea how emotions work, have you? And this goes for you as well, Spaceman."_

The Doctor grinned, a bit of tension released alongside with the words: "It's good to hear you, Donna."

_"Well, I wouldn't mind **seeing you**. And not this old, yellow-eyed, rough bloke who looks like you. No offence."_

A faint mumbling that could either be "None taken" or "Well, I am a snake" came from the other side.

"Speaking of seeing you," The Doctor carried on while bouncing his leg, starting to suffer the stillness imposed by the wires connecting the phone to the computer, "I'm working on a way to get back, but it would be easier if I remembered anything from the switch. Crowley, do you have any recollection, any weird dream, anything?"

Crowley made a weird clicking sound, probably with his tongue. From the other side came overlapping voices saying "How did he do that?" and "What was _that_?". 'Definitely his tongue', the Angel thought. _"No. Sorry."_

The Doctor sighed heavily. "No clues, no TARDIS..."

_"Although-"_

The Doctor almost dropped Aziraphale's phone. He glanced at the owner of the device, whose eyes were currently screwed shut in concentration.

_The Doctor created a perfectly functional mean of communication between Universes, it's going to hold, and all will be well._

_"No, it's probably unrelated._ "

"We have to try everything, keep going."

_"A few days ago, I was... running some errands, when I stumbled upon the Them."_

Aziraphale attempted a partial tuning in the conversation, managing a quite solid balance: Crowley had mentioned this instance, but then the conversation had quickly shifted to éclairs and next thing they knew, they were watching tv on the Demon's couch.

_"By the way, the Them are a group of childr-"_

"Yes, yes, Aziraphale told me." The Doctor cut him off, before mumbling: "Sorry, keep going."

_"Well, for one it was weird for Them to be in London instead of Tadfield, and they looked upset. Adam said something about a priority lane, but I didn't stop to ask th--m a--yt--g."_

The Doctor looked at Aziraphale, whose forehead was now glistening with sweat. The Angel shook his head. "I can't keep this open much longer, but I think I know what Adam was referring to."

The Doctor turned back to the phone. "The signal is about to be cut off, I might be able to get back in contact eventually, but the equipment will need at least 12 hours to be ready for usage. We'll check on those Them and see where it gets us. Meanwhile you stay in the TARDIS, and _don't wander off._

_"Or what?"_ Aziraphale was by now convinced he did _not_ like the owner of that voice. _"You're not exactly here to stop me... I mean, **us**."_

The Doctor clenched his jaw. "12 hours. Donna, when this is over I'm taking you to a spa. The best one in the Universe."

From the other side came a loud scoff. _"And about time too, Spaceman."_

_"Be careful, angel."_

Aziraphale's eyes fluttered closed. "You too, my dear. After all," He added with a smile as soft as his voice, "I would quite hate to miss our honeymoon."

The phone call was interrupted. A disembodied voice informed the two that the number they called could not be reached or did not exist, and if they would please try again.

Aziraphale collapsed on a chair, wiping sweat from his brow with a silk handkerchief. His eyes met with the Doctor's tired, but fairly optimistic ones.

"You did a great job, Aziraphale." The Time Lord awkwardly stated, unplugging the phone from the computer and slowly disassembling the various components to let them cool off. "I'm sorry to give you more work to-"

Aziraphale raised a finger to shush him, folding his handkerchief and placing it in his pockets. "I will do whatever is necessary. It took literally the Apocalypse to separate Crowley and me, and even _that_ failed. Losing him to a parallel universe would — quite frankly — feel somehow insulting." He slowly stood up, giving the Doctor a determined look. "Now, let's go talk to the Antichrist."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There might be a lil bit of a hiatus, because I've been having a creative draught, as one might call it, but don't worry! I'm working hard to make the next chapters as cool as the first ones! <3


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the huge hiatus, thanks for bearing with my absence, and most importantly, 1k hits?! All hail the Glow Cloud! Thank you very much for the hits, kudos, and most importantly comments! I thoroughly enjoy going through them while writer's block plagues me <3  
> Unfortunately school is right around the corner, so updates won't be _that_ much more regular :( And I've been struggling a little recently, so I'm prioritising other stuff.  
> But I'm still working! Chapter 5, we're halfway theere (woooaah, the Doctor on a chaair)!
> 
> Stay safe everyone, thanks again, hope you enjoy this weird lil thing ✩✩✩

The Master, in his 900 years of — rather turbulent and far from continuous – life, had hardly ever seen someone as smitten as Crowley in the moments immediately following the phone call.

Donna had to pry her phone away from the perfectly still Demon's hands, waving a hand in front of his sunglasses to check if he was still conscious. The results left very little hope. "I think we've lost him."

"Tragic." The Master's dry remark felt particularly forced, as he absent mindedly fiddled with a lever. Every once in a while he glanced up to the leash tied next to him.

Donna patted the Demon lightly on his shoulder, before walking up to the console. Not exactly near the Time Lord, just in close enough proximity to get a good look at his expression, but far enough to maintain a safe distance.

No dancing around the truth: the Master scared her. He reminded her of a more feral version of the Doctor, the first time they met: a merciless god, detached from other puny creatures and unafraid to slit a few throats, to reach his goal.  
Except the Doctor — at the worst Donna had seen of him — was a tortured man adopting aloofness as a coping mechanism, reluctantly taking the mantle of threatening deity to impart a form of so-called justice. While the Master — on the other hand — seemed to take vainglorious pleasure in establishing himself as a superior entity, relishing the sight of lowly beings squirming beneath him as he held power over their life and death. The Master craved power, the Doctor had power unwillingly bestowed upon him. No wonder the former's hatred of the latter was inextricably bound with deep seated jealousy.

"Are you..." Donna hesitated: how to phrase things to a mentally unstable evil genius? "What will you do now?"

"Now I will retire in my accommodation — or without sugarcoating, you lock me up in the room I'm usually confined to — for 12 hours straight, until the Doctor calls again and you need someone to explain things to you." Rather than venom, slightly bitter expired iced tea dripped from his words. The Master seemed to be in a good mood — or rather, a confused enough one to make him slightly tamer.

Crowley had just now come to his senses and hastily excused himself to another room. When Donna asked for further specification on the room he was going to, the Demon — already disappeared from sight — replied in a slightly altered voice: "Any room."

Donna wasn't going to bother him, nor bring him down from the seventh heaven he seemed to currently and ironically be in, so she turned to the Master and said — gathering all of her courage: "When I said 'Doctor', earlier on the phone... your face lit up."

The Master froze, the only indication of him having heard Donna's words being a twitch of his hand and his jaw clenching. He all of a sudden became intensely preoccupied with the status of the console, maintaining his gaze fixed on it as he let out an imperceptibly shaken: "And what of it?" Shifting position — retracting ever so slightly from the human — he continued: "The Doctor has been thwarting my plans for so long, it would have felt... disappointing for such a worthy adversary to disappear like that."

From the tense silence that ensued, it was clear that Donna was not convinced. The Master decided in that exact moment that his first act as ruler of the Universe would be tracking down Donna's family and torture them in front of her eyes. It did not help that her single question had been enough to stir up doubts and anxieties he had been repressing ever since he settled as a — willingly or unwillingly — permanent passenger on the TARDIS.

Donna opened her mouth to object and pursue the subject, when a violent shaking almost sent her to the ground. "What the bloody hell did you do?!" She screamed, holding to the console as the TARDIS began dematerialising.

The Master didn't dignify her with an immediate answer, but his surprised expression was a convincing enough argument for his innocence: he studied the writings on the monitor, trying to figure out the destination of their unexpected journey. "Something's attracting the TARDIS. Physically pulling her across the Time Vort-" Another tremor, stronger than the previous one, cut his sentence abruptly off and elicited a "What is going on here?!" from a very startled Demon, stumbling in the main control room in that very instant.

"Do something!" Donna yelled, ignoring the newcomer and tightening her grip so much her knuckles turned as white as her face. "You always say you can fly this thing better than the Doctor!"

"Normally, I could!" The Time Lord defended himself, straining to get to the other side of the console. He would have gladly shown her his TARDIS pilot certificate — summa cum laude, to the instructor's chagrin — but currently it could only impress the few dust mites which had managed to find their way on a high shelf of a secluded room far into the depths of his own TARDIS. "I can't control her!"

Finally — after a few more shakes, a couple of shrieks, and the first instance of blessing used as an invective Donna had ever witnessed — the TARDIS landed, giving one last defiant wheeze.

The Master typed something on the keyboard, squinting at the Gallifreyan characters in rapid succession. "I'm taking a look outside." He went for the door, forgetting about the leash. The leash, unfortunately, did not reciprocate the curtesy by forgetting about its duty, and the Time Lord was yanked back to the console.

"You're not going _anywhere_ without me, Drumman!" Donna knew better than to leave the Master unsupervised, especially now that he had the upperhand: he was the only one who could fly the TARDIS, and only a strong will and a certain amount of stubbornness could have kept him from taking full advantage of the situation. Strong will and a certain amount of stubbornness were exactly what Donna was hoping to convey, as she wrapped the end of the leash around her wrist with a determined expression.

Meanwhile, Crowley had climbed down the brown thing upon which he had slithered as soon as the first tremors had started, and was now straightening his sunglasses. "I thought we had to stay put. At least, that Doctor guy said so."

"Come on, you're a demon, shouldn't you be all about breaking the rules?" The Master allowed himself a snicker, as he moved towards the TARDIS door.

Donna, however, had other plans. She held him back and pulled him away from the entrance. "Why is it that you Time Lords are _so clever_ , and yet lack basic common sense? What if the thing that attracted the TARDIS wants to take possession of it and use it for some kind of evil scheme? You can't just open the door without checking outside! If you die, I won't hear the end of it!"

"She has a point." Crowley eyed the door with cautious suspicion, as if it were a bomb ready to detonate. "I'm not sure what would happen if I discorporated in another Universe, but I'm not willing to find out."

"Fine." The Master — followed by a still suspicious Donna — went to grab a stethoscope and crouched next to the door, placing the instrument against the keyhole and listening carefully.

_"Trust me, all your problems are going to be solved."_ The voice sounded eerily familiar, but the Master couldn't quite place it: he was sure he had heard it somewhere recently. _"The Doctor is a great man and a friend of mine, he will surely agree to help you."_  
A knock at the door startled the Time Lord, as he finally remembered who the owner of the voice was.

"A friend of the Doctor." He briefly explained to the other two, tossing the stethoscope away. "One particular friend who will _not_ be happy to see me."

"Nothing new, then." Donna began walking towards the door, when the Master stood up in front of it, in order to block her passage.

"Think about it," He spat out, "someone sees the TARDIS and immediately recognises it. Someone who's just finished praising the Doctor to a bunch of people and who's going to find it a _little_ hard trusting me. Do you think you can just walk out there and introduce yourself?"

"We have to do something! Maybe we can get the Doctor's friend inside the TARDIS, and then explain the situation to him." Donna stared at the Master from head to toe. "No offence, but I think I give off a less... _'deranged villain' vibe_ than you."

"Still, if this cretin talked about the Doctor, people out there will expect to see the Doctor. The cretin included."

Before anyone could add anything else, Crowley cleared his throat to catch their attention. "If they want to see the Doctor, there could be a solution." Once four puzzled eyes were fixed on him, he shrugged. "It can work just long enough to convince the 'cretin' to get in here without stirring up too much trouble. Have you got a picture of the Doctor?"

Two minutes later, the TARDIS doors theatrically swung open, revealing a brunette with showy sunglasses. "Hello, I'm the Doctor, sorry, I need to speak a moment alone to-" The "Doctor"'s head disappeared inside the telephone box, speaking in an inaudible mutter: _"Captain_? Really?"  
His head popped out once again, with a nonchalant grin. "Sorry, problems with the... timey wimey. Now, I need to speak a second or two with my good friend, Captain Jack Harkness."

§§§

Aziraphale had spent the first hour of the bus ride silently revising everything that had happened in a few hours.  
He hadn't seen Them ever since the Armageddoff, and had been convinced up until that morning that it would have stayed that way for a long time.

Speaking of time, his pocket watch informed him that it was 12:38, and his thoughts wandered to that lunch date Crowley and him were supposed to go to that day. The idea triggered a chain reaction that ended — his former musings a contributing factor — with him wondering whether Time Lords needed to eat. About an hour later he communicated his doubt to the only Time Lord available (easy pick, considering he knew in person exactly one Time Lord, and they happened to be seated next to each other) and the Time Lord answered with a cryptic: "Not really."

The conversation had begun to lack from that point forward.

While they were at the bus stop, Aziraphale had profusely apologised for not being able to physically carry them to Tadfield, explaining that all things considered the bus was the most convenient option — especially now that they knew that everyone in the other Universe was doing well.

The Doctor — getting on the bus — had agreed, but overall sported an unenthusiastic relief. Prodded by a few questions, he had revealed the predictable subject of his preoccupation: the Master, whose role in the Time Lord's life the Angel had not quite understood. From there, the Doctor had shut himself in a pensive silence, which had lasted up to Aziraphale's question about Time Lords' eating habits, and had continued semi-uninterrupted until they got off the bus, two hours later.

But there was something else hanging unspoken.

Angels are beings of love — theoretically speaking, that is — and they are particularly good at perceiving love and other similar positive feelings pertaining people or things all around them.  
The Doctor, metaphysically speaking, _reeked_ of love. All kinds of love, as a matter of fact. This man was the love equivalent of a nuclear explosion.  
Among the bittersweet ocean of affection, the Angel could now identify a specific current of feeling, threatening to become a tidal wave: a deep fondness towards a single, special person, recently rekindled by a single spark of hope. Aziraphale found it had, metaphysically speaking, a sweet, flowery scent.

The thought was immediately archived, when they stepped in front of a cosy little house, matching _the_ address. The Doctor gestured with his head to a small figure moving on the other side of the fence. "Is that him?"

"Yes."

The — one might argue former — Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness (also known as Adam Young), was throwing a stick to his dog in his garden, seemingly unconcerned by the cold air of that particular February afternoon.  
He looked up at the two men — technically the two human-male-shaped individuals — and frowned.  
"I know you. You're the one I gave a body to."

Dog at Adam's feet scratched behind his ear, almost unconcerned by the newcomers: his Master didn't perceive either of them as a threat, so he had no intention of even trying to appear menacing.

Aziraphale gave a quick nervous glance to the former Hellhound — although he knew the beast was now harmless, he still wasn't immune to uneasiness. "You remember, then."  
Crowley and him hadn't really thoroughly checked up on the kids, nor anyone else: after they had made sure everyone was doing alright, they had headed straight home. Besides, at that time the Angel had been busy racking his brains to decode the last prophecy of Agnes Nutter (witch), so he deemed himself fully excused for his partial distraction during the farewells.

"Of course." Adam crouched to give Dog a quick pet. "You're the Doctor from the telly, right?" He asked, turning towards the Time Lord, who looked as though a long time friend-turned-enemy had just thrown him off an astronomy tower.

"I'm sorry, what?!"

"Yeah, Dr Who, in the police box. You can help us, right?"

Aziraphale shot a confused glance towards the Doctor, who wasn't showing signs of recovering (at least not any time soon).

Admittedly, his knowledge of television only went as far as:  
\- adaptations of novels he particularly enjoyed (which usually implicated a long, heated conversation-bordering-on-soliloquy with Crowley on how "the changes made to the original source material fundamentally flatten the themes and the character arcs, not to mention the useless departures from the authors' original descriptions of the characters");  
\- occasionally that one charming show about a placid English inspector solving grisly crimes in a picturesque town, or that other even more charming show about a witty old lady solving grisly crimes in a picturesque town, and then recollecting the murders in her writing (both towns, Aziraphale often found himself musing, should probably have been decimated by about season four of their respective TV shows);  
\- The Great British Bake Off.

He knew that Crowley was particularly fond of Gilmore Girls and The Good Place — the Angel himself had watched the latter, and found it puzzling but intriguing — and that the Demon had had quite a lot to do with most tv game shows, but he couldn't recall Crowley ever mentioning a certain Doctor Who on the television. And he was — surprisingly enough — astonishingly good at remembering things concerning Crowley.

"Dear boy," Aziraphale decided to take the conversation in his own hands (if anything to allow time for the poor Doctor to recover), "with what _exactly_ does the Doctor have to help you? Has it got anything to do with a priority lane?"

Adam furrowed his brows. "How did you know?"

"Heaven has been keeping an eye on a certain priority lane in central London for a while, now. We- _they_ thought it had something to do with Hell, but seeing as Crowley didn't recognise it, I'm assuming it's something else."

It was now the Doctor's turn to give the Angel an inquisitive stare. "I thought you two cut ties with Heaven and Hell."

Aziraphale flushed lightly. "Yes, er... we reckoned it'd be best to keep one eye open, so to speak. Just in case."

The Doctor nodded lightly. "So," he mumbled, partly to Adam — but mostly to himself — "in this Universe I am a fictional character in a TV show, you saw me and decided I could help you, so you pulled me away from my Universe and into your own." He took a proper stare at Adam, looking if not ready to face the conversation again, at least able to form a coherent thought on the subject.

Aziraphale was observing Adam, patiently waiting for the Doctor to wrap his head around the whole situation. He remembered quite vividly the sheer _energy_ the kid emanated, an aura of power that managed to fill his very being with complacent dread.  
The kid in front of him, however, had nothing of the sort: he still retained an unmistakable leadership-oriented vibe, but it was not nearly as threatening as it was in his days as an Antichrist.

"Alright." The Doctor was now grinning lightly, as if he had just accepted to take part in a particularly hard challenge he was sure to win. "Never could resist a good old mystery. Now, tell me what the problem is."

Adam frowned, pointing at his house. "Before that, what about my parents? They always tell me not to talk to strangers, and for them you two are strangers, so they might freak out. And I doubt they'd let me go alone to London with two strangers."

The Doctor's grin flickered for a few seconds; it came back even wider and turned mysterious, as he moved to the door, reaching at the inner pocket of his suit. "I can take care of it, no problem."

Adam's eyes were glinting with excitement. "Are you going to use your psychic paper?"

The Doctor abruptly turned around, finger already midway to the doorbell. "What- But- How-" He sputtered, before regaining composure. "Right. The TV show. Just... how much do you know about me, exactly?"

Adam shrugged. "Up till you're a girl. Pepper loves that season, she says it's her favourite."

The Doctor, although shaken, couldn't help but smile. "I'm going to be a girl?! Brilliant! But wait... what season is that?"

"11."

"And what season am I supposed to be in?"

"Who are you travelling with?"

"Donna Noble and the Master."

Adam nodded gravely, the insight he held in the situation clearly shown in the serious expression on his face. "Season 4, with some changes."

The Doctor — already overwhelmed by the idea of having 7 seasons to look forward to — grimaced at the 'with some changes'. "What do you mean? Also, how can it only be 4 seasons?"

Adam shrugged again. "The series got canceled and then renewed, 's all complicated. But we didn't like how season 3 ended, so we came up with the idea of the Master not dying in the finale, and we wrote our own version of the story. We always do."

Aziraphale couldn't shake the feeling that the boy had been the one to come up with the idea, and the rest of the Them had approved of it. "That does explain why you of all parallel Doctors have been chosen. Your life most closely aligns Adam's... vision for the show."

But the Doctor was barely listening. "I'm sorry, did you say that... the Master died?"

Aziraphale could feel the heartbreak (heartsbreak? The Doctor mentioned a weird anatomical detail, probably a binary vascular system) behind the Doctor's words. Although, with what little he knew about the Master (whatever transpired from that one phone call), it was quite hard for him to properly empathise with the other.

"Yeah, shot by his wife. Mum said it was too violent for kids our age."

"Is... does he... does he come back?"

One question can lead to another, and another, and another: it wasn't hard for the Angel to figure out that the Time Lord was on the brink of asking Adam for a detailed mapping of his entire future life.  
"My dear," He addressed the Doctor, cutting the boy off before he could reply, "I can imagine how eager you must be to know all about what's to come."  
(And he really could: in his darkest moments, he had wished hardly anything more intensely than speaking to God Herself, questioning Her about the Great Plan. What he wouldn't have given, during those times, to know what She had in store for him...)  
"However, I really don't think it would be wise for you to learn about your fut-"

"You're right."

Aziraphale blinked, staring dumbfounded at the Time Lord. He was most definitely not expecting convincing him to be _that_ easy.

The gloom in the Doctor's eyes seemed to be showing his real age: he tried to brush it off with a overly cheerful expression. "It's fine: I don't like spoilers, anyway. Besides, what happens in the TV version of my life in this Universe is not my concern. Now, I think we've delayed this moment long enough, don't you two think?"  
And with that — not waiting for a response by either of the two — he turned to face the door again and rang the doorbell, hand strategically placed inside the pocket where his psychic paper lied.

Aziraphale could swear he heard a soft 'Allons-y' coming from him, right as the door swung open.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter update in under a month? Don't get used to it!  
> I haven't been in a good place recently, so it takes me a while to produce above decent content, once again, bear with me.

"Doctor! It's good to see you... are you okay?"

Jack had just been dragged inside the TARDIS, and had been too busy staring at the "Doctor" — trying to figure out why he seemed off — to take a good look at his surroundings.

"How did I do?" Crowley asked, miracling himself back to normal as soon as the door shut.

_"Timey wimey?!"_ Donna glanced at the newcomer, going back shortly thereafter for a more thorough stare — upon which she established that she liked what she was seeing.

"Trust me, that bit was spot on." The Master muttered, leaning against the console with the grimace of someone who's seen one made-up-words-filled convoluted explanation too many, back in their days.

_'For the last time, Theta, you can't describe Artron energy as 'lifeying sparkle-mist'!'_   
_'Why not, Koschei? You get what I mean!'_   
_'And I'm the only one, along with the rest of the Deca!'_

All it took was the sound of his voice to freeze Captain Jack Harkness on the spot.  
His face had the exact same colour and expression of someone in that precise, dreadful moment when they realise they accidentally tagged the wrong person in a particularly weird Instagram post. "You..." He turned to face the Time Lord, who was standing next to Donna, crossing his arms with a disproportionately pleased smile.

" _Captain, my Captain..._ " His saccharine tone, combined with his sick grin, gave everyone in the room a full body shiver — and was probably a contributing factor to Jack's nauseated face. "It's been _too_ long... how's everyone?"

Jack was barely a step away from growling at the Master. "Where's the Doctor? What have you done?!"

"Why does everyone assume it's my fault? I could almost get offended." The smirk didn't leave the Time Lord's lips even when Donna stepped forward to clarify the situation.

"Hi, I'm Donna, by the way. Donna Noble. Anyway," she hastily added, having the decency to leave any flirting to a safer time, "I've been travelling with the Doctor for a while now, and I can assure you the Master has nothing to do with this. And he is practically harmless. See?" She gave the leash a tug, prompting a glare from the Time Lord. "The Doctor is fine, he's _just_ in a parallel universe."

Jack had just managed to catch his breath and recover from the sight of the Master, when the piece of news sucked the newfound air out of his lungs. "Is... is he with Rose?" He asked quietly after a brief silence, hopeful melancholy colouring his tone.

Crowley shot Donna — the most approachable person in the room, apparently — a confused glance, as the Master pretended to have lost interest in the conversation. He had long since given up on keeping track of every single human plaything the Doctor had insisted on growing overly attached to.

Donna's eyelids fluttered for a few seconds, as she swam her way through a half buried — but still uncomfortably close — memory. "No, I'm sorry. I don't think so. He told me about her, though."

That single exchange gave Crowley a decent enough context to figure out the background.  
It has been said that Demons can't feel love, let alone understand it. However, that particular Demon had always shown a tendency for deviance (even for Hell's standards). "Right... can we skip this part and go back to fixing the situation?"  
He _was_ still far from perfect as far as handling emotional situations was concerned.

"By the way, I didn't catch your name." Jack took a step closer to Crowley, eyes darting up and down, thoroughly inspecting his appearance with puzzled enticement.

The Demon shrugged with a grin, mild annoyance tugging at his lip and making it twitch lightly. "I didn't throw it."

Jack — still clearly not fully convinced by the situation — was endeared by the reply, as shown by his partially raised eyebrow and the warm light chuckle escaping from his throat.  
"I deserve at least to know what you are, and why you look almost exactly like the Doctor, don't you think?"

"Watch out, Captain, he's a married man." The Master's grin was _audible_ and earned a wince from Jack — the Time Lord's voice was like a razor blade, poking at a sensitive patch of skin that had failed to heal properly, threatening to reopen the wound.

"I want to talk to the Doctor." His face turned to stone, his words a harsh blizzard covering the room with frost. "I can't trust you, not after-"  
He cut himself off, not capable of recounting his past encounter with the Master, at least not out loud. He looked as though he had been locked in an invisible indestructible cubicle, which was slowly but inevitably being deprived of oxygen.

"He said he would call in..." Donna hastily chimed in, before even actually checking the current time. "10 hours and a half. His equipment needs time to cool out." She further explained, prompted by Jack's skeptical expression.

Crowley was starting to lose his patience. "Look, Captain Whatever, I can _feel_ waves of pent up anger and spite coming from you, and I get that he must have hurt you really badly, but my... _husband_ is in my Universe waiting for me, and I am forced to spend time here with you all, so _please_ , make it a little easier by accepting immediately the situation."

Jack opened his mouth, then closed it, then changed his mind and opened it again, only to definitively shut it.

The Master was thoroughly amused. "I hate to cut this lovely banter short, I really do, but something has literally pulled the TARDIS across the Time Vortex, and I wouldn't mind finding out what that something is."

Jack's eyes briefly widened. "It could be _them_."  
Before anyone could ask him for further explanation, he pointed at the TARDIS door. "There are people out there who need the Doctor."

"Tough."

Donna glared at the Master, slowly pointing at the leash to _subtly_ remind him of his condition. "If they need help, we can give it to them. And they might be able to help us, or at least give us a clue as to what could have brought the TARDIS here."

The Master gave her a look so condescending, she might as well have been explaining to an award-winning mathematician that 2+2=4. "I am perfectly aware of that, and I also know where this scenario is going."  
Prompted by a moment of silence in which three pairs of eyes were inevitably drawn to him, he continued. "The Doctor Lookalike will pretend to be the Doctor, in order to pacify whoever is out there, but not being able to replicate his intelligence on top of his looks, someone else will have to work on a way to solve their problems. Someone either as clever as the Doctor, or more so." At that, he gave his audience a brief cocky smirk. "I fall in the second category. And seeing the competition around these parts, it appears I am those poor poor people's only hope to get out of whatever situation they're in alive." 

Everyone in the room was struck by the overwhelming urge to punch the Master right on his teeth. Everyone, except the Master himself, who was smugly crossing his arms with a "Tell me I'm wrong, I dare you" expression comfortably settling on his face.

Crowley was the first one to speak. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but... you have no choice in the matter. You either help those people, or get stuck here."

"Or," The Master nonchalantly turned to the console, fidgeting with a switch just to keep his hands busy, "I could actually do as I'm told, be a nice little prisoner and stay here for however long the Doctor will be away. Then, I let him take care of those simpletons, and I will never have to see you again."

He briefly glanced up, to see Crowley stepping closer and shaking his head. "I don't think you've got it in you to just stay put. I think you're tempted to know more about what got us here, even if it means playing nice. And even if I'm wrong, I think..." His hand landed uncomfortably close to the Master's fingers, which had been tapping on the console for a while, without him even noticing. "... _I think you owe me a favour_."

The Master's hand jerked away, as if the console had become scorching hot all of a sudden. "I have nothing better to do." He muttered, tugging at the leash. "Let's go."

Donna glared at him — again — before staring in surprised awe at Crowley. "I have to be honest, I didn't think you could do something so..."

"Suave? Brilliant?"

"Even remotely authoritative."

Crowley — after a few seconds of undignified spontaneous stammering — managed to reply with a sharp "Shut up", which elicited a very indignant — and just as spontaneous — "Oi! Watch it!" from Donna.

Jack had his eyes fixed on the Master, with the scrupulous worry of a person keeping close surveillance on an unstable nuclear reactor. "So, you've agreed to help us? No conditions?"

The nuclear reactor gave Jack a radioactive grin. "Captain, my Captain, don't you trust me?"

Jack shivered: his whole body was tensing, as though bracing for the cold bite of a well-sharpened blade.  
"Can you blame me?"

The laugher that ensued was bone-chilling, and lasted uncomfortably long. "No. Not at all. But isn't it just... _hilarious_ how you have no other choice?"

Donna slowly approached Jack, clutching the leash tighter. "Don't worry. He's harmless, now."

The word 'declawed' popped up in the Master's head, and he scowled.

Jack sighed. "I guess I really don't have any other choice, huh? Alright. Let's go."

Crowley blinked, and was back to looking like the Doctor.

"How come you're so on board with helping strangers?" The Master asked, while being dragged by Donna towards the TARDIS doors. "I was under the impression that Demons don't-"

"I'm not doing it for them, nor for any of you." Crowley snapped, making a point of turning his head the other way and adjusting his sunglasses on his nose. "I'm doing it for _him_."

The Master did his best to repress the smirk on his face. "Of course, my dear. Of course."

Crowley pretended he didn't hear him. "Captain Whatever?"

"Jack. Jack Harkness. _Demon?_ "

"Yes, that. Has the Doctor got any catchphrase? He seems like the kind of person who has got a catchphrase."

Jack frowned. "The last time I saw him, he said 'Allons-y' a lot. _Demon?!_ "

"Perfect." Crowley took a deep breath, forcefully loosening the tie.

The Master cast a brief glance to the Demon, his anxiety betrayed by the soft tapping on his thigh.

If anyone out there had previously met the Doctor, they would have been able to tell that something was off now. Despite the perfect copy of his physical traits, something — mainly in his posture and his overall more laid-back-yet-fidgety attitude — gave away that something was off. It could have signified the downfall of their entire plan, and who knew what failure could entail, what, with no TARDIS, no sonic screwdriver, no Doct-

The Time Lord caught himself tapping, and immediately curled up his fingers in a tight fist, to force himself to stop before anyone could notice. _'No Doctor = good'_ , why did he keep forgetting that? In any case, they could only hope that no one out there was knowledgeable enough of the Doctor to tell the difference.

"The name's Crowley, by the way." Crowley addressed Jack, oblivious to the Master's worry. "And yes." He added, giving the Captain a grin. " _Demon._ Now, allons-y."  
He pulled the door open, adjusting a smile on his face as he sauntered outside. "Sorry for the delay. Now, can anyone tell me what is going on here?"

§§§

"Hello! My name is John Smith, and this is my associate..."

Luckily, Aziraphale was quick to catch the hint. "Mr. Fell."

"We're here to inform you that your son..."

"-Adam Young-"

"Yes, thank you, Mr. Fell, has won a 3 days stay in London at our school, effective immediately. Every expense covered by us, including meals and transport."

Arthur Young was leaning forward to inspect the Doctor's document, and nearly lost his balance when Dog dashed between his legs and into the house. "Professor and creator of the William Shakespeare Initiative for Budding Writers... is this about that one story you wrote about the pirate policeman?"

"Pirate detective." Adam corrected him, while the Doctor and Aziraphale nodded vigorously.

"Exactly." The Doctor confirmed, with the swift confidence of a practiced liar. "We were very impressed by his work."

Being very much English by nature, Mr. Young deemed it appropriate to invite the two strangers inside, for a cup of tea. The two came in, but - despite both looking very much English by nature - politely declined the tea, saying that they were in a hurry.

"How weird, we weren't aware of any of this. Deirdre?" He called; Mrs. Young emerged from the bedroom. "Have we received any mail about a certain Budding Writers initiative?"

"Doesn't ring a bell. I'll check the mailbox."

Aziraphale blinked.

Mrs. Young came back with an envelope, with a stamp dating it a few weeks prior. "That's odd. I checked it a week ago, and there was nothing in it."

The Doctor glanced at Aziraphale, who gave him a conspiratorial smile. "Right, then we'll be on our way. Pack your bag, Adam."

"Hold on." Mr. Young held up a hand, right as Adam was about to dash to his room. "I still have a few questions. You don't expect me to just leave my child with complete strangers, right?"

The Doctor and Aziraphale glanced at each other. "Of course not." The latter chuckled lightly, following the former's example by sitting down in front of Mr. Young. "We're ready to answer your every question."

Roughly an hour and a half (and a cup of tea with scones) later, Aziraphale and the Doctor were triumphantly leaving the Young family's residence, with the former Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness, carrying his pirates-themed suitcase.

"I'm sorry you couldn't bring your pet." The Doctor said, glancing back as Mr. and Mrs. Young apprehensively stared at them from their front door.  
The flash in Aziraphale's eyes suggested that although he too was sorry, he surely did not mind going around without a former hellhound a feet away from his angelic vessel.

"S'alright. Dog will be fine. He'll just wait for me until I get back."

"I have to say, this wasn't _so_ hard." Aziraphale hummed, checking (once more) that the child was safely walking on the pavement.

"Yeah, only three more to go."

The Doctor stopped on his tracks. He turned towards Adam. "What do you mean?"

Adam stared at the two with candid innocence. "Did you think I was going to leave my friends behind? I need them."

The Doctor barely concealed a deep, heartfelt sigh.

Roughly three hours, two cups of tea with scones and one herbal infuse with lembas (Pippin Galadriel Moonchild's mother was once again true to herself) later, the Doctor and Aziraphale were leading four overexcited children into a taxi and out of Tadfield.

The Them spent a little under an hour muttering to each other. The taxi was built in such a way that there were three seats facing three other seats: the Angel, the Time Lord and the ex-Antichrist sat on the driver's side, facing the other three children. Thus forcing Pepper, Wensleydale and Brian to lean forward in order to be able to discreetly ask Adam insistent questions, and not-so-discreetely stare at the Doctor — making it abundantly clear who the subject of the discussion was.

The Doctor — on the other hand — had scanned the four children with the sonic screwdriver, and was now holding the device barely a few inches from his face, frowning.

"This took... er... longer than expected." Aziraphale finally blurted out after quite some time, tracing with his fingertips scratch marks left around the window by passengers gone by. However, he forced himself to stop, as soon as he realised that his touch was reverting the scarred interior surface of the vehicle to factory-level pristineness.

The original plan was to get Adam and go back to London by bus, having enough time during the trip alone to both rest and ask questions.

... then again, with a delay of a whooping four hours and a half, Aziraphale had deemed appropriate a slight change of said plan.

The cab driver — who had just finished recounting his brother's fourth marriage in excruciating detail — cheerfully stated: "It's a true miracle that I was passing nearby!"

The Angel nodded, shooting a glance at the glass panel diving the front of the car and the back.

"I wasn't going to, you know? I was going to go back to Three Bridges, since my niece is about to have knee surgery. Honestly, her parents should have seen it coming during that one family field trip in 2009 to-"

Without any physical intervention from anyone, the glass panel miraculously shut itself, and got stuck that way.

The Doctor — after putting away his screwdriver in defeat — stared inquisitively at Aziraphale, who cleared his throat.

"Well, I couldn't just go and tell him to stop talking, could I? Besides," He nervously added, as the kids had stopped confabulating and were giving him the same stare as the Time Lord, "now we can speak in private."

The Them collectively glanced at each other, nodded, archived the incident and moved on.

"He's the real Doctor, right?" Pepper inquired, slouching forward to poke at the Time Lord's cheeks. "He's not the actor, or a guy dressed as the Doctor?"

"They're called 'cosplayers'." Wensleydale yanked the Doctor's arm forward and placed two fingers on his wrist. "There was an article about them in a magazine. But this one has a weird pulse, it would be _in-probable_ for him to manage to fake i>that."

The Doctor patiently subjected himself to the close scrutiny of the Them, saved by Adam confirming to his friends: "It's him. I told you, he can help us with the Thing."

Instantly, the kids sobered up, a shadow crossing momentarily their faces.

"Yes, about the Thing... what is it, exactly?" The Time Lord was now leaning forward, hands folded on his lap barely managing to stay still.

The rest of the Them turned their eyes to Adam.

Aziraphale turned his head to the former Antichrist.

Adam cleared his throat, accepting his role as the spokesperson. "We found it during a school trip to London. We were at a weird Indian art exhibit-"

"' _Indie_ '." Wensleydale automatically corrected him, before plunging back into deep silence.

" _Indie_ art exhibit, and we had to stop for a while because one of the Johnsonites had to use the loo."

Aziraphale had only a nebulous idea of what the kid was referring to, but he nevertheless nodded to encourage the kid to go on.

"That's when Wensleydale saw the lines to buy tickets. You know, how there's sometimes a special lane which gives the priority to some kinds of people, especially old people, pregnant people, people with disabilities-"

"-which is a great thing, because it makes culture and art more accessible-" Pepper chimed in, and the other Them gave her a heartfelt nod: bit by bit, they were brightening up again.

"-yeah, but the thing is, this time there were two of them, and one was closed off. And that one went _around_ the actual ticket booth, to a weird door. We asked Mrs. Millan, but she had no idea what we were talking about."

The Doctor nodded, shifting in his seat once more: Aziraphale barely restrained from urging him to 'sit properly, my dear boy'.

"She couldn't see the priority lane, she said there was just a wall there. So we waited for the right moment, when everyone was distracted, and snuck under the cordon and to the door."

The Doctor frowned. "And no one stopped you? Not even your teacher?"

"She was busy." Pepper explained. "A few of our classmates were feeling sick."

Aziraphale couldn't help but glance inquisitively at Adam, who shook his head in genuine sincerity and felt compelled to clarify the situation.

"Wasn't me, I swear."

"It was probably the tap water." Wensleydale adjusted his glasses on his nose.

Brian nodded. "The sign said 'drinkable', but we didn't trust it."

"So, you entered the room?" The Doctor shifted the focus of the conversation back to the main point, too eager to get to the bottom of the mystery to indulge in superfluous politeness.

Adam nodded, and the Them's expressions darkened once more. "The door wasn't locked, and there was no sign saying to keep out."

The Doctor's gaze turned distant for a couple of seconds, as if reminiscing about a distant time in which he had found himself using a similar excuse multiple times. He was quick to recover, though. "What was behind the door?"

The Them glanced at each other several times, in a silent, heated debate. In the end, Adam stared at Wensleydale, and the four children collectively nodded.

Sometimes, Aziraphale got a reminder of why he loved humans.

"It depends." Wensleydale tortured the hem of his jumper by twisting it in his sweaty palms.

The Doctor frowned. "Depends on what?"

"On who you are."

The Time Lord would have gladly asked for further explanations, but a loud knock startled him, and everyone in the cab.

The driver cheerfully waved at them from behind the glass, mouthing the words 'we're here' and 'the glass is stuck'.

Fearing an oddly specific personal anecdote about stuck windows from the driver, Aziraphale promptly opened the car door and let the kids out. "You'll have time to explain it later. Poor things, you must be exhausted."

The Doctor begrudgingly convened with the Angel and kept a rather distracted eye on the children as they grouped on the pavement, already lost in speculation.

Aziraphale - who had gone to pay the cab drive - managed to slip away from the chatty driver when the latter's foot 'accidentally' hit the accelerator, sending the car out of earshot.

"Right, my bookshop. Let's go."

The children glanced at each other again. Adam voiced their main concern, at the moment. "We're starving. It's nearly dinner time, isn't it."

The Doctor looked puzzled, as if he hadn't contemplated human meal schedules (up until that point in this specific occasion, or in general).

"Well, in that case..." Aziraphale cleared his throat, looking at the Doctor: maybe a nice meal would have helped him calm down. And, in truth, despite the circumstances, he _was_ feeling quite peckish. "Can your questions wait a couple of hours?"

The Doctor stared at the children, who were hopefully returning the stare.

"If it can weigh in on your decision," Wensleydale said quietly, "I don't think any of us can handle talking about what we saw with an empty stomach."

The children nodded again, and a sparkle of paternal instinct gleamed in the Doctor's eyes for a split second. He promptly recovered from that as well, giving the children a big, friendly smile. "Of course they can wait! It's been a while since I last had fish and chips, anyway. Allons-y!"


End file.
